Kanban Change Leadership Creating a Culture of Continuous Improvement

Explains how and why Kanban offers a new approach to change in 21^st Century businesses

This book provides an understanding of what is necessary to properly understand change management with Kanban as well as how to apply it optimally in the workplace. The book emphasizes critical aspects, several traps which users repeatedly fall into, and presents some practical guidelines for Kanban change management to help avoid these traps. The authors have organized the book into three sections. The first section focuses on the foundations of Kanban, establishing the technical basis of Kanban and indicating the mechanisms required to enact change. In the second section, the authors explain the context of Kanban change management—the options for change, how they can be set in motion, and their consequences for a business. The third section takes the topics from the previous sections and relates them to the social system of business—the goal is to guide readers in the process of building a culture of continuousimprovement by reviewing real case studies and seeing how Kanban is applied in various situations.

Kanban Change Leadership:

• Explains how to implement sustainable system-wide changes using Kanban principles
• Addresses the principles and core practices of Kanban including visualization, WIP limits, classes of service, operation and coordination, metrics, and improvement
• Describes implementation, preparation, assessment, training, feedback, commissioning, and operation processes in order to create a culture of continuous improvement

Kanban Change Leadership is an educational and comprehensive text for: software and systems engineers; IT project managers; commercial and industrial executives and managers; as well as anyone interested in Kanban.

Appraisals x

Foreword xii

Preface xvi

Part 1 Kanban 1

1 Introduction 3

1.1 What we Care About 4

1.2 Who should Read this Book 6

2 Kanban Principles and Core Practices 8

2.1 Seeking Productivity 9

2.2 kanban and Kanban 12

2.3 Evolutionary Change Management 15

2.3.1 Knowledge Work: The Problem of Invisibility 17

2.4 Kanban Core Practices 18

2.4.1 Making the Work Visible 18

2.4.2 Limiting the WiP 19

2.4.3 Managing the Flow 20

2.4.4 Making Policies Explicit 21

2.4.5 Implementing Feedback Mechanisms 22

2.4.6 Carrying Out Collaborative Improvements 22

2.5 Implementation of the Core Practices in an Organization 23

3 Visualization 25

3.1 First Step: Defining the Extent 26

3.2 Second Step: Visualizing the Process 27

3.2.1 How Are Work Items Visualized? 28

3.2.2 Representation of Parallel Processing 30

3.2.3 Representation of Activities Without a Fixed Sequence 32

3.3 Determining the Work Item Types 32

3.3.1 Visualization of Work Item Types 34

4 WiP limits 38

4.1 The Advantages of WiP Limits 39

4.1.1 Making Problems Visible 41

4.1.2 Making Bottlenecks Visible 42

4.2 Setting WiP Limits 48

4.2.1 Size of the Input Queue 48

4.2.2 WiP Limits for Various Work Item Types 49

4.2.3 Consequences of Different WiP Limits 50

5 Classes of Service 53

5.1 Cost of Delay and Policies 54

5.1.1 The Class of Service “Expedited” 56

5.1.2 The Class of Service “Fixed Delivery Date” 57

5.1.3 The Class of Service “Standard” 59

5.1.4 The Class of Service “Intangible” 60

5.2 Capacities of Classes of Service 61

5.3 SLAs 62

6 Operation and Coordination 65

6.1 Daily Stand�]up Meeting 66

6.2 Queue Replenishment Meeting 67

6.2.1 Backlog Maintenance 69

6.3 Release Planning Meetings 69

6.3.1 What Is a Good Delivery Cadence? 70

6.4 Team Retrospectives 72

6.5 Operations Reviews 72

7 Metrics and Improvements 74

7.1 Metrics in Kanban 75

7.2 Cumulative Flow Diagram 77

7.3 Measuring the Lead Time 79

7.3.1 Throughput 80

7.4 Rework and Blockers 82

7.4.1 Blockers 82

7.5 Improvements 83

7.5.1 Theory of Constraints 84

7.5.2 Reducing Waste 86

7.5.3 Reducing Variability 86

Part 2 Change and LEADERSHIP 89

8 Forces of Change 91

8.1 Turbulent Times 92

8.2 Turbulent Change 95

9 Environments and Systems 100

9.1 Organizations Close�]up 103

9.2 A Roadmap for Change 106

10 Organizational and Personal Change 110

10.1 The Iceberg of Change 112

10.2 The Change Curve 115

10.2.1 Fear and Resistance 116

10.2.2 Rational Insight and Emotional Acceptance 117

10.2.3 Applying the New Behaviors 118

10.2.4 Learning and Integration 119

11 Emotions in Change Processes 122

11.1 Uncertainty Worry and Anxiety 123

11.2 Anger and Aggression 126

11.3 Sadness and Disappointment 128

11.4 Enthusiasm Joy and Courage 129

12 Corporate Culture and Politics 133

12.1 The Power of Corporate Culture 136

12.2 Corporate Culture and Micropolitics 139

13 Conclusions for Kanban Change Leadership 142

13.1 Mindfulness 143

13.1.1 A New Paradigm for Management and Leadership 145

13.2 Communication 148

13.2.1 The Meaning of Joint Reflection 152

13.2.2 The Power of Dialog 154

13.3 Process Design 156

Part 3 Kanban CHANGE LEADERSHIP 161

14 From the Idea to the Initiative 163

15 General Clarification 167

15.1 Clarify the Method 169

15.2 Clarify the Organizational Context 171

16 Deeper Understanding 175

16.1 The Personal Retrospective 176

16.2 The Team Constellation 179

16.3 The Change Dialog 182

16.3.1 Empathy 185

16.3.2 Delimitation 186

16.3.3 Objectification 186

16.4 The Team Conversation 188

16.5 The Team Retrospective 191

16.6 The Stakeholder Map 195

16.7 The Stakeholder Interview 197

16.8 Stakeholder Workshop 200

16.8.1 Feedback Through the Kanban Sponsor 201

16.8.2 Feedback from the Stakeholders 203

16.9 Solo Dialog Coaching or Training? 205

17 The System Design Workshop 208

17.1 Identifying the Work Item Types 213

17.1.1 Filling the Stakeholder Map with Work Item Types 214

17.1.2 Criteria for Decisions Concerning Clusters 215

17.1.3 White Noise: Background Voices 216

17.1.4 Variation 1 217

17.1.5 Variation 2 218

17.2 Identifying the Processes 219

17.2.1 Finding the Work Steps for Our Work Item Types 219

17.2.2 Simulation and Ticket Design 222

17.3 Determining the Wip Limits 224

17.3.1 Step 1: Finding the Right Capacities 225

17.3.2 Step 2: Translation into WiP Limits 227

17.3.3 Distribution of the WiP Limits for a Support or Test Team 232

17.4 Determining the Classes of Service 234

17.4.1 Creating Clarity between Work Item Types and Classes of Service 235

17.4.2 Defining the Policies 237

17.4.3 Establishing the Capacities of the Classes of Service 238

17.5 Defining the Measurements 241

17.5.1 Selecting the Appropriate Measurements 243

17.5.2 Step 1: Teamwork: Identification of Possible Measurements 243

17.5.3 Step 2: Determining the Initial Handling 244

17.6 Determining the Frequency of Meetings 246

17.6.1 The Daily Stand�]Up Meeting 247

17.6.2 Team Retrospectives 248

17.6.3 The Queue Replenishment Meeting 249

17.6.4 The Release Planning Meeting 251

17.7 Concluding the System Design Workshop 252

17.7.1 Simulation of the Entire Kanban System 252

17.7.2 Conclusion 253

18 Operation 256

18.1 Moving from a Failure Culture to a Learning Culture 258

18.1.1 Yes I Make Mistakes 260

18.1.2 A Particular Mistake: Slack 262

18.2 Facilitation 264

18.3 Conflicts in Operation 269

18.3.1 An Important Stakeholder Doesn’t Stick to the Agreements 270

18.3.2 The Team Relapses into Old Habits 271

18.3.3 Collaboration Is Plagued by Dysfunctional Behavior 273

18.4 Carrying the Kanban Fire Onward 275

list of Figures 278

references 281

Index 287

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